'Project Censored' Cites The Progressive Populist for 3
Stories

Three articles that appeared in The Progressive Populist were
cited among the most under-covered news stories of 2001-2002 by
Project Censored. The media research project at Sonoma State
University announced 25 "censored" news stories, which are published
in the annual book Censored 2003 from Seven Stories Press. Nearly 200
faculty, students, and community experts reviewed over 900
nominations for the awards, which also included stories that appeared
in late 2000. They were ranked by judges that included Michael
Parenti, Robert McChesney, Robin Andersen, Norman Solomon, Carl
Jensen, Lenore Foerstel and some 20 other national journalists,
scholars and writers.

"We define censorship as any interference with the free flow of
information in American Society," stated Peter Phillips, director of
the project. "Corporate media in the United States is interested
primarily in entertainment news to feed their bottom-line priorities.
Very important news stories that should reach the American public
often fall on the cutting room floor to be replaced by sex-scandals
and celebrity updates."

Articles cited from The Progressive Populist include Frosty
Troy's "Dunces of Public Education Reform," Nov. 15, 2000, which
dealt with the seventh-most-underreported issue of "Corporations
Promote HMO Model for School Districts;" David Corn's "Smog Screen,"
March 15, 2002, in the 15th-ranked "Bush's Energy Plan Threatens
Environment and Public Health;" and Harry Kelber's "Temps are Ready
for Organizing If AFL-CIO Provides the Muscle," June 1, 2001, in
21st-ranked "Large US Temp Company Undermines Union Jobs and
Mistreats Workers."

1) FCC Moves To Privatize Airwaves. For almost 70 years, the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has administered and
regulated the broadcast spectrum as an electronic "commons" on behalf
of the American people. In February 2001, 37 leading US economists
requested, in a joint letter, that the FCC allow broadcasters to
lease, in secondary markets, the frequencies they currently use under
their FCC license. Their thinking was that with this groundwork laid,
full national privatization would follow, and eventually nations
would be encouraged to sell off their frequencies to global media
enterprises. The few non-allocated bands of the radio frequency
spectrum would be sold off, as electronic real estate, to the highest
bidders. In private hands, the frequencies would be exchanged in the
marketplace. Sources: London Guardian, April 28, 2001, and Media File
Autumn 2001 volume 20, #4, title: "Global Media Giants Lobby to
Privatize Entire Broadcast System" by Jeremy Rifkin; Mother Jones,
Sept/October 2001, "Losing Signal" by Brendan Koerner; Media File,
May/June 2001, "Legal Project to Challenge Media Monopoly" by Dorothy
Kidd.

2) New Trade Treaty Seeks to Privatize Global Social Services.
The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is a proposed
free-trade agreement that will attempt to liberalize/dismantle
barriers that protect government provided social services.
Corporations plan to use the GATS agreement to profit from the
privatization of educational services, health care systems, child
care, energy and municipal water services, postal services,
libraries, museums, and public transportation. If the GATS agreement
is finalized, it will lock in a privatized for-profit model for the
global economy. GATS/WTO would make it illegal for a government with
privatized services to ever return to a publicly owned, non-profit
model. Source: The Ecologist, February, 2001, "The Last Frontier" by
Maude Barlow. International media coverage: Toronto Star, 3/3/02, The
Herald (Glasgow) 2/27/02, The Hindu, 11/17,01 The Weekend Australian,
8/25/01, The Gazette (Montreal) 6/15/01 The Financial Times
(London)

3) United States' Policies in Colombia Support Mass Murder. In
July of 2000, the US Congress approved a $1.3 billion war package for
Colombia to support President Pastrana's "Plan Columbia." Throughout
these past two years, Colombian citizens have been the victims of
human rights atrocities committed by the US-trained Colombian
military and linked paramilitaries. Trade unionists and human rights
activists face murder, torture, and harassment. Another problem
resulting from the Columbian "drug war" has been the health
consequences of the US-sponsored aerial fumigation. Since January
2001, Colombian aircraft have been spraying toxic herbicides over
Colombian fields in order to kill opium poppy and coca plants,
killing food crops that indigenous Colombians depend on for survival,
as well as harming their health. The US provides slightly over $1
billion of military aid for what is known as "Plan Colombia," yet it
is more a war against citizens and those who are fighting for social
justice. Sources: Counter Punch, July 1-15, 2001, "Blueprints for the
Colombian War," by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair;
Asheville Global Report, October 4, 2001, "Colombian Army and Police
Still Working With Paramilitaries," by Jim Lobe; Steelabor, May/June
2001, "Colombian Trade Unionists Need US Help" by Dan Kovalik and
Gerald Dickey; Rachel's Environment & Health News, December 7,
2000, "Echoes of Vietnam," by Rachel Massey.

4) Bush Administration Hampered FBI Investigation into Bin Laden
Family Before 9/11. A French book Bin Laden, la verite interdite (Bin
Laden, the forbidden truth) claims that the Bush Administration
halted investigations into terrorists activities related to the bin
Laden family and began planning for a war against Afghanistan before
9/11. The authors allege that under the influence of US oil
companies, the Bush administration initially halted investigations
into terrorism, while bargaining with the Taliban to deliver bin
Laden in exchange for economic aid and political recognition. Brisard
and Dasquie contend that the governmentís main objective in
Afghanistan was to unite the Taliban regime in order to gain access
to the oil and gas reserves in Central Asia. They report that the
Bush government began negotiations with the Taliban directly after
coming into power and representatives met several times in
Washington, Islamabad, and Berlin. Jane's Defense News reported in
March 2001 that an invasion of Afghanistan was being planned.
Sources: Pulse, Jan. 16, 2002, "French book indicts Bush
Administration," by Amanda Luker; Times Of India, Nov. 8, 2001, "Bush
took FBI agents off Bin Laden family trail"; The Guardian (London)
with BBC television News Night, Nov. 7, 2001, "FBI and US spy agents
say Bush spiked bin Laden probes before 11 September," by Greg Palast
and David Pallister. Corporate media coverage: L.A. Times,
1/13/02.

5) US Intentionally Destroyed Iraq's Water System. During the
Gulf WAR the US deliberately bombed Iraq's water system. After the
war, the United Nations applied sanctions against Iraq, which denied
the importation of specialized equipment and chemicals, such as
chlorine for purification of water. Documents have been obtained from
the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which prove that the Pentagon
was fully aware of the mortal impacts on civilians in Iraq and was
actually monitoring the degradation of Iraqís water supply.
This document states that epidemics and disease outbreaks may occur
because of pollutants and bacteria that exist in unpurified water.
The United Nations estimates that more than 500,000 Iraqi children
have died as a result of sanctions and that unclean water is a major
contributor to these deaths. Sources: The Progressive, September
2001, "The Secret Behind the Sanctions: How the US Intentionally
Destroyed Iraq's Water Supply" by Thomas J. Nagy.

6) US Government Pushing Nuclear Revival. The US Government is
blazing a trail of nuclear weapon revival leading to global nuclear
dominance. A nuke-revival group, supported by people like Stephen
Younger, associate director for Nuclear Weapons at Los Alamos,
proposed a "mini-nuke" capable of burrowing into underground weapon
supplies and unleashing a small, but contained nuclear explosion.
Princeton theoretical physicist Robert W. Nelson concluded, "No
earth-burrowing missile can penetrate deep enough into the earth to
contain an explosion with a nuclear yield even as small as 1% of the
15-kiloton Hiroshima weapon. The explosion simply blows out a massive
crater of radioactive dirt, which rains down on the local region with
an especially intense and deadly fallout." Billions more would be
needed to produce and maintain a new generation of nuclear weapons.
This plan has not been presented to the public for their
consideration or approval. Sources: Bulletin Of The Atomic
Scientists, July/August 2001, "The New-Nuke Chorus Tunes Up" by
Stephen I. Schwartz. Corporate News Coverage: Los Angeles Times,
March 17, 2002, USA Today, March 18, 2002.

7) Corporations Promote HMO Model for School Districts. The aptly
named Educational Management Organizations (EMOís) are being
touted as the new answer to impoverished school districts and
dilapidated classrooms, the real emphasis is on investment returns
rather than student welfare and educational development. Schools with
already limited resources, serving poor and minority communities,
will be those under the greatest pressure to boost scores or face
loss of funding as a result of Bushís proposal for national
standardized testing. Additionally, standardized testing funnels
public dollars directly to non-public schools, including religious
schools, through taxpayer-supported vouchers. Vouchers shunt kids out
of the public schools system and into private for-profit
institutions. The reality is that, though most EMOís have yet
to show investors a profit, they generally cut teacher salaries,
eliminate remedial, special, and bilingual education programs
(mandated for public schools), and consistently perform at or below
the level or surrounding schools in test scores. Sources:
Multi-National Monitor, January/February 2002, "Business Goes to
School: The For-Profit Corporate Drive to Run Public Schools," by
Barbara Miner; The Progressive Populist, November 15, 2000, "Dunces
of Public Education Reform," by Frosty Troy; North Coast Xpress,
Winter 2000, "Corporate-Sponsored Tests Aim to Standardize Our Kids,"
by Dennis Fox; In These Times, June 2001, "Testing, Testing: The
Miseducation of George W. Bush," by Linda Lutton

8) NAFTA Destroys Farming Communities in US and Abroad. The North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) are responsible for the impoverishment of and loss of many
small farms in Mexico and Haiti. NAFTA is also causing the economic
destruction of rural farming communities in the US and Canada. In
both Mexico and Haiti, NAFTA policies have caused an exodus from
rural areas forcing people to live in urban slums and accept loz paid
sweatshop labor. These same corporations have entered into massive
farming ventures outside the US and use NAFTA to import cheaper
agricultural products back into this country , further undermining
the small farmers in the US. The resulting loss of rural employment
has created a landslide of socio-economic and environmental
consequences that are worsening with the continued dismantling and
deregulation of trade barriers. Sources: Fellowship of
Reconciliation, Dec. 2000/Jan. 2001, "NAFTA's devastating effects are
clear in Mexico, Haiti," by Anita Martin; The Hightower Lowdown,
September 2001, "NAFTA gives the shafta to North America's farmers,"
by Jim Hightower.

9) US Faces National Housing Crisis. The national housing crisis
affects nearly 6 million American families and is growing worse. Over
1.5 million low-cost housing units have recently been lost, and
millions of children are growing up in housing that is substandard,
unaffordable and dangerous. Still, politicians refuse to add federal
funded housing to the US budget. Low-cost housing programs are slowly
being drained of funding. More than 100,000 federally subsidized
units have been converted to market-rate housing in the past three
years. While the $5 billion Federal Housing Administration surplus is
tied up in Washington, neither major political party seems responsive
to the current housing crisis. Neither party is addressing issues of
living wage, adequate health care, or affordable housing.
Homelessness has become the result for many families across the
nation. Source: In These Times, November 2000, "There's No Place Like
Home," by Randy Shaw. Corporate media coverage: US Newswire, 1/18/02.
Other corporate coverage mostly limited to local and regional housing
issues

10) CIA Double Deals In Macedonia. The CIA destabilized the
political balance in Macedonia to allow easier access for a
US-British owned oil pipeline, and to prevent Macedonia from entering
the European Union (EU), thereby strengthening the US dollar in a
German deutschmark dominated region. It's an effort supported by Wall
Street's financial establishment, to destabilize and discredit the
deutschmark and the Euro, with hopes of imposing the US dollar as the
sole currency for the region. The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and
the National Liberation Army (NLA) were trained in Macedonia by
British Special Forces and equipped by the CIA. In a strange twist
the CIA, NATO, and British Special Forces provided weapons and
training to the NLA/KLA terrorists, while at the same time, Germany
provided Macedonia's security forces with all-terrain vehicles,
advanced weapons, and equipment to protect themselves from NLA/KLA
attacks. Last year's conflict in Macedonia is a small part of a
growing rift between the Anglo-American and European interests in the
Balkans. In the wake of the war in Yugoslavia, Britain has allied
itself with the US and severed many of its ties with Germany, France,
and Italy. Washington's design is to ensure the dominance of the US
military-industrial complex, in alliance with Britain's major defense
contractors, and British-US oil. Sources: www.globalresearch.ca, June
14, 2001, "America at War in Macedonia" by Michel Chossudovsky;
www.globalresearch.ca, July 26, 2001, "NATO Invades Macedonia" by
Michel Chossudovsky

11) Bush Appoints Former Criminals to Key Government Roles. The
Nation, May 7, 2001, "Bush's Contra Buddies," by Peter Kornbluh; In
These Times, Aug. 6 2001, "Public Serpent; Iran-Contra Villain
Elliott Abrams is Back in Action," by Terry Allen; Extra,
September/October 2001, "Scandal? What Scandal?" by Terry Allen; The
Guardian, Feb. 8, 2002, "Friends of Terrorism" by Duncan Campbell;
Feb. 18, 2002, "No More Mr. Scrupulous Guy" by John Sutherland;
Washingtonian, April 2002, "True or False: Iran-Contra's John
Poindexter is Back at the Pentagon" by Michael Zuckerman

12) NAFTA's Chapter 11 Overrides Public Protection Laws of
Countries. The Nation, October 15, 2001, "The Right and US Trade Law:
Invalidating the 20th Century" by William Greider; Terrain, Fall
2001, "Seven Years of NAFTA" by David Huffman.

13) Henry Kissinger and Gerald Ford Lied to the American Public
about East Timor. Asheville Global Report, 12/13/2001, "Documents
Show US Sanctioned Invasion of East Timor" by Jim Lobe, (IPS).

14) New Laws Restrict Access to Abortions in US. Mother Jones,
September/ October 2001, "The Quiet War on Abortion" by Barry
Yeoman.

21) Large US Temp Company Undermines Union Jobs and Mistreats
Workers. The Progressive Populist, June 1, 2001, "Temps are Ready for
Organizing If AFL-CIO Provides the Muscle" by Harry Kelber. Labor
Ready Inc. is a national temporary employment agency that employed
over 700,000 people in 2000. Labor Ready has 839 offices in 49 states
and in Canada, and stands ready to place temporary workers as
strikebreakers in union labor disputes.